The Malik Report

Detroit Red Wings star Pavel Datsyuk is suing an Oak Park man he alleges has been selling hockey jerseys and other clothing containing his name, number and likeness without his permission.

A hearing is scheduled for Wednesday before Oakland Circuit Judge Martha D. Anderson in the lawsuit, filed against Pasha LLC, Pasha Sportwear and Terrance Sullivan. Pasha is Datsyuk's nickname.

Anderson has issued a temporary restraining order against the group from "using any word, name, mark, likeness or combination thereof which may be calculated to falsely represent" the products are being sold with the permission of Datsyuk.

The hearing will be to determine why Anderson should not make the action a permanent injunction.

There's a significant amount of on and off-ice news regarding the Red Wings thanks to today's practice and news regarding Brendan Smith and Darren Helm's injuries, and off the ice, Crain's Detriot Business's Bill Shea's following up his report about the potential 2013 ground-breaking upon the site that the Wings plan on building their new rink with an article discussing the possible naming options for the follow-on facility:

While a new hockey arena could be called something like Joe Louis V. 2.0, odds are the new Wings home will have a corporate name because naming rights deals are an easy source of cash to pay down construction debt.

One possible naming rights contender is Ada-based Amway Corp. In September 2011, the Wings inked a deal with Amway, the network-based direct-marketing giant, to become the team's first-ever presenting team sponsor. Financial terms were not disclosed, but that contract is thought to be a two-year, seven-figure deal.

Amway said last year it isn't involved in the project. That could change at any time. The company has a number of other pro sports investments, such as holding the naming rights of the Amway Center, home to the National Basketball Association's Orlando Magic

Updated 8x at 4:45 PM: The Red Wings officially recalled Tomas Tatar and Petr Mrazek from Grand Rapids this morning, placing Brendan Smith (shoulder) on the IR to make room for Tatar and swapping out Tom McCollum for Mrazek, and while there is a modicum of good news in the injury department as the Wings' practice begins...

The Detroit Red Wings took Superbowl Sunday off after sustaining a blow to their collective confidence in the form of a 4-2 loss to the Columbus Blue Jackets on Sunday, and the team's decision to recall both Petr Mrazek and Tomas Tatar on Sunday evening suggests that the team doesn't anticipate Jonas Gustavsson (groin), Mikael Samuelsson (groin), Jan Mursak (shoulder) or anybody else save perhaps Ian White (lacerated quadriceps) to return any time soon.

Carlo Colaiacovo (shoulder), Samuelsson, Gustavsson and Darren Helm (back) are hoping to do little more than take small steps toward getting back into hockey shape this week, and Joey MacDonald (back) hoping to head down to Grand Rapids for a two-week conditioning stint soon (thus the goalie shuffle, with Tom McCollum heading back down to Grand Rapids on Sunday evening).

Worse, the Wings believe that Brendan Smith's going to miss at least two weeks after suffering a left shoulder injury in Columbus, with Smith likely to spend today hanging out in an MRI machine at the Detroit Medical Center, and the team's severely undermanned defense (again, White wants to return on Tuesday, but whether Dr. Douglas Plagens will allow White to jeopardize the sutures holding his muscles together is another story) will be facing a very angry Calgary Flames team on Tuesday.

Given the economic mess that the City of Detroit is in, the continued corruption investigations facing Wayne County and the still-somewhat-tenuous economic status of the State of Michigan's ability to broker just about anything these days, I and probably you have been assuming that the Detroit Red Wings won't begin to build Joe Louis Arena's follow-on facility for another 4-6 years at the earliest.

And this evening, Shea's back at work, suggesting that the Red Wings will break ground on a new rink within the next year, and that the rink itself may take under two years to build, with the rest of the Ilitch Holdings/Olympia Entertainment-proposed retail, corporate and residential-use construction taking a little longer to complete at the location between Cass and Woowdward Avenues just north of I-75:

Mrazek's promotion could enable the Red Wings to give Jimmy Howard a much-needed break. Howard has started all eight games this season. The Red Wings play back-to-back home games Saturday (Edmonton) and Sunday (Los Angeles).

Mrazek is having a strong rookie season with the Griffins. He is 16-7-1, with a 2.26 goals-against average and .916 save percentage. He played in the AHL All-Star game and recorded his first shutout as a pro on Saturday, 1-0 over Abbotsford. Goalie Tom McCollum, who backed up Howard the past six games, was reassigned to the Griffins.

The Detroit Red Wings are recharging their batteries after wrapping up their second of 12 sets of back-to-back games in the form of a 4-2 loss to the Columbus Blue Jackets on Saturday night.

The Wings will play 13 more times over the course of February's final 24 days, with 4 games over the course of 6 nights scheduled for this upcoming week and next weekend, so the Wings rather desperately need some good news on the injury front. They're not going to get it: this afternoon, the Free Press's Helene St. James confirms that Brendan Smith will miss approximately two weeks after suffering a shoulder injury during last night's loss:

The Detroit Red Wings took a 27-minute flight back to Detroit from Columbus on Saturday night, perhaps feeling (as well as publicly looking) a world away from the team that happily shuffled off to Columbus after rallying to defeat the St. Louis Blues 5-3 on Friday.

The Wings laid an egg on Saturday night, plain and simple, dropping a hideous 4-2 decision to the Blue Jackets, and none of the 19 Wings whose skates hit the ice during Saturday's game had a decent night.

The Wings lost the game, the Wings lost whatever momentum and/or identity-building that the team achieved via defeating the Blues, and the Wings lost the services of Brendan Smith, who suffered a right shoulder injury that will be tested further when the Wings return to practice on Monday. It's assumed that Smith will miss at least two weeks of action, with Brian Lashoff rotating into the lineup--unless Ian White is going to return on Tuesday against Calgary (which dropped a 3-2 shootout decision to Chicago on early Sunday morning Detroit time).

About The Malik Report

The Malik Report is a destination for all things Red Wings-related. I offer biased, perhaps unprofessional-at-times and verbose coverage of my favorite team, their prospects and developmental affiliates. I've joined the Kukla's Korner family with five years of blogging under my belt, and I hope you'll find almost everything you need to follow your Red Wings at a place where all opinions are created equal and we're all friends, talking about hockey and the team we love to follow.